By Arin Loeffelholz
A shapeshifter. Going from throwing and slamming enemies with fire to quickly dashing and slashing with white-green magic. Her hair shifts from a fiery dark red to white as the character changes, countering and landing attack after attack on the other character. The character attacks with water blasts filled with a white glow, her lavender-pink hair flowing behind her, dark black and blue wings sprouting as she dodges an attack from her opponent. One final blow, dealt by the firey character to the other girl, cascasting her in fire. Off screen, behind the controller, a girl comforts her friend as he groans in frustration, once again losing to his teammate as they practice for an upcoming Super Smash Bros match against another school.
There is a special bond between player and character, an attachment, something that causes a person to be drawn to their chosen character. Whether found intentionally or simply by accident, every player has a preferred character eventually.
In eSports, there are two games where players play and battle against pre-made characters, Overwatch and Super Smash Bros, and each player has the chance to play with any character and find their best fit. Due to the amount of new players on the LHS eSports team this year, they’re trying out the characters and finding out which character they not only like the best, but also play the best.
Konnor Holmes in 7th grade and plays Super Smash Bros and the main character they play is Enderman which is a variation of the character Steve. When Konnor began playing Super Smash Bros, he was searching for a character and basically going through the 89 playable characters to find one he liked.
Holmes said, “I played a couple matches with some bots, and I was actually pretty good…and I spotted Enderman, and Enderman was my favorite mob from Minecraft.”
For context, ‘skins’ just change the appearance of characters, not the actual characters’ moves or moveset. Which brings up another topic of discussion: the Super Smash Bros team has almost completely new teams. Of these, there are eight or nine people on varsity and junior varsity, there’s been a general consensus of confidence and enjoyment among the team.
Coach Nate Simons has been coaching for six years, with five of them coaching Super Smash Bros.
Simons said, “It is definitely a rebuilding year. But at the same time, I feel like it’s a different sort of atmosphere… It’s a lot of people who haven't done this before, where before it was people that have been doing it for four or five years already.”
He also adds to his statement, that in terms of how well the teams are doing, that it is nice to win but it is also important to have fun and have a good time. Of which, is exactly what the players are having. Whether winning or losing, the players manage to laugh and have fun together, smiling and laughing together as they play their chosen characters, forming new bonds with new teammates and strengthening bonds with old ones.